


Of The Ashes

by SilverShortyyy



Series: The Last Requiem [9]
Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Gen, Post-Episode: s08e05 The Bells, Season/Series 08
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-19
Updated: 2019-05-19
Packaged: 2020-03-07 22:52:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18882874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilverShortyyy/pseuds/SilverShortyyy
Summary: Post-S08E05Varys was always the people. As a child. Growing up. Even in the small council chamber, or around any number of monarchs, he was still the thief, the child that lived in the gutters, the boy who was snatched away by a sorcerer as if any boy other than the nobility was worth less than nothing.So, till the end, Varys did not walk away.Tyrion finds he cannot wrap his head around it, around any of it.





	Of The Ashes

Why do they think you lie when you say you do things for the good of the realm?

Have people become so surrounded by their own rotten nature that they’ve scarce to see the better possibilities?

You’ve spent the better part of your life gambling away at things these people see to be beneath them, gambling away and playing their game for reasons none of them would ever bet their money on.

The face of priviledge is so sweet, it is sickening. Wealth, power, status; they have faces and tongues that say all or nothing, do or die. They want it all, or they want to have none of it.

In the beginning, they had made the mistake of clumping you together with the rest of their rotten kind, and maybe you are rotten as them, but maybe intentions change the rottenness, make some fruits better than others. Or maybe intentions don’t matter, really.

Sometimes, you tell yourself it is their mistake to think that just because you have interests apart from theirs, you are not a threat to them regardless of how skilled you are at yielding your power and playing their Game. Sometimes, you tell yourself it is strategic prowess on their part to wield a puppet as yourself for their personal agenda.

And what do you say of it, even, if your own agenda coincides with theirs? Surely it is much more convenient, much easier to let them do the work while you ride on their waves?

That is how your game is played, anyway, so you have played it as you always have.

Then decisions come and decisions go, and sometimes decisions do you good, sometimes not.

Sometimes your decisions do the realm good, sometimes not.

But then your games are made for you to be a puppet, and not a master. A puppet, regardless of the impression you have placed upon most, to be controlled and wielded by others. A puppet, whose ownership depends on who would give the children the best morals of the story. A puppet, of the realm and only the realm, who lets himself be wielded by the elite and the power-hungry for the sake of having a better position in the Game of Rule or Die.

You cannot rule, either. The throne of swords would only be thorns, and you of all people know that someone haunted is someone who cannot rule.

So you pull the strings as only a puppet can learn. Pull, so that the right hands may hold you, and the wrong hands will lose their grip.

Knock, knock.

Ashes, ashes. Your power is in cinders and so will you, in a few heartbeats. Maybe the realm will turn to ash. You hope not. The end makes you believe other things, though, and Death had always been the dance partner you could avoid, but all chases end.

One ring, two rings. They clatter at the bottom of the bowl. Your strings get cut one by one.

You always fought for the player you bet on, the one whose stories could give the best morals to the young, to the children.

Your little birds will whisper, but now, they will never know anything other than to run.

If you have any regret, it would be that.

The soft creak of the door, open the door.

To the end, for the realm. Lest the end of the realm.

Never mind the end of you.

* * *

Tyrion never stopped having trouble sleeping, since the first time he actually knew about death.

Which is to say, never, since his father constantly implied that Tyrion would’ve been better off dead, whether because he was a dwarf, because his mother died giving birth to him, or whatever other reason his father could look for.

Most nights, Tyrion feared Death, and hated it.

Fear, and hatred.

And a little bit of a wish to prove himself.

But tonight, Tyrion regrets Death.

Fire and blood, oh fire and blood indeed. But Varys never quite lied, did he? Varys was never the type to be loyal to a person, was he? And he’d told Daenerys, straight to her face:

“You wish to know where my true loyalties lie? Not with any king or queen, but with the people.”

Did Tyrion make a mistake?

No. No, no, he didn’t. Maybe Varys was making a choice with the highest likelihood to be beneficial to the realm, but Daenerys was still the girl they’d met in Meereen, if not a little worn and battered. Who wouldn’t wish for it all to end quickly after losing not one, but _two_ people they love and trust with their whole heart?

What if, Tyrion thinks, it had been him to die instead, than Ser Jorah?

That would have been best for Her Grace’s state of mind. Dead Tyrion is better than Dead Jorah.

Yet here they all are.

Tyrion can do nothing but stare at the ceiling, remembering the way Vary’s shiny head disappeared in Drogon’s flames, burned within seconds, turned to ash.

Fire and blood. Fire and ash.

Ash.

Nothing was left of Varys. Not a ring, not a heart.

Just ash.

Tyrion wonders if it was the right choice. If he should have kept his mouth shut—

But Varys was always wiser. Wiser and more controlled. More measured. More rational.

More stagnant and true to his word.

Tyrion, however, never quite had the chance to be sure of himself as Varys surely was.

All these years.

Tyrion falls asleep to his own heartbeat. Varys’ beat no longer. Tyrion dreams of that moment, that last moment; Varys, his most loyal (if not only) friend, eyes not hating him one bit on the edge of death.

How did he do it? How could Varys understand, even when everything is stacked against him?

The dawn is cold, but no day ever felt warm anyway.

Some days, like today, are just colder than others.


End file.
